We took Benjamin to a clothes store couple of days ago and to our
surprise we found that he was not willing to enter the place. It was
strange as he never disliked that store before. We'd started going
there frequently after we moved into the neighbourhood.

It took us a while to realize what really bothered him. It was the
headless mannequins kept over there.  There were two of the sort in
there. One was used to display men's outfits and the other to display
women's outfits. Initially he only saw the male one.

Ben has always been an observant kid, but here, he noticed this
headless thing from quite far away. He would not let us go anywhere
near it. The salesman had seen him many times and wondered why he was
scared of only one and not the other. Actually the one in the mens
outfit was quite obvious, but the female one was in a corner where it
wasn't. As soon as he noticed it, he got scared of it too. We even
wondered if he actually understood what the salesman said.

Ben was scared of darkness since he was 8months old. He would not
crawl into dark rooms or if the lights were switched off he'd crawl
out quickly. But this was the first time we saw him getting visibly
scared and jump onto us, pleading to carry him. We had to leave that
place immediately and postpone our shopping for another day. I guess
we will not be able to go there with Ben for sometime until he
overcomes his fear.

This incident left me thinking. Our little Ben is growing now and he
is starting to realize many things.  He might be able to understand a
lot more than what we actually give him credit for. This morning I was
overwhelmed to see Ben getting organized by putting his shoes back
onto the shoe rack after he returned from his morning walk. His fear
of the mannequins hinted at a growing understanding of the world
around him. I can't wait to see what happens next!